Friday, January 18, 2013

SMOTM: 40 Days of Green Smoothies Review & Giveaway

Ahoy hoy! Today's post is gonna be some big-fat-fluffy smoothie talk. I hope you're ready, 'cuz Becky from the lovely Glue & Glitter, sent me a review copy of her digital smoothie plan 40 Days of Green Smoothies, and I'm gonna tell you about it. I'm also gonna give away a free copy, so read to the end or you might miss out.

Bird glasses make smoothies great.

If you're new to green smoothies, or want to be new to green smoothies, 40 Days is a thorough, well organized primer that'll guide you on a daily smoothie route for 40 days. Becky has specifically designed this e-book to show you how to keep your pantry stocked with weekly shopping lists, which will not leave your wallet naked. These are super budget friendly recipes. Also, you don't need a spanky-pants fancy blender. Repeat: you will NOT break the bank or your Target blender on these recipes.

Now to be honest, Becky and I come from different schools of ol' Smoothie Nation. The smoothies I generally make are stuffed with frozen fruit and always contain some protein powder, because I need a sweeter smoothie to be able to enjoy it, and my body needs the additional protein.

Becky's philosophy is a little different:

"Unlike more conventional smoothies, I also go easy on the frozen fruit. Fruit is super tasty and full of nutrients, but it’s also expensive and contains a lot of sugar. Most of my smoothies only use a small amount of frozen fruit. The banana or avocado, greens, and vegan milk give them their bulk."

WTF. Did Becky just call me conventional‽

You should buy this e-book if you're looking for healthy, low-sugar/no-sweetener added smoothies brimming with nutrients and packed with the good omega stuff. Or, you should also buy this if you need more ideas for smoothies and are comfy tweaking an easy smoothie recipe to get it where you want it. I wish I'd had this when I first started down the green smoothie brick road, 'cuz I was a little lost and would have loved Becky's understanding yet firm hand grasping.

Here are some of my favorite things about 40 Days of Green Smoothies:
❤ The weekly grocery lists and organized chapters make daily green smoothie doses super easy.

❤ Since I'm already a fancy smoothielier, my freezer and pantry were already stocked with the ingredients needed for these recipes, no grocery trip was required for me.

❤ The portion sizes are one serving, but super generous. I always eyeball my smoothies and make too much. Now I know how much of what I need to make one good-sized Bell jar full.

❤ I wish I had this as a primer when I first started making green smoothies, 'cuz it would have made the transition much easier for me.

❤ I love how the smoothies are numbered instead of given cheesie names. They made me feel futuristic and stuff.

❤ The smoothies use an awesome variety of greens from chapter to chapter (kale, spinach, collards, parsley, beet and chard). Seriously, you will be a bad ass in your friends' minds when you tell them you put collards in your smoothies. Whoa.

❤ The recipes are low-sugar to save you from diabetes and to save your budget (frozen fruit is high in the sugar and wallet departments).

❤ The recipes are nutrient dense.

My critiques:

★I had no idea, but I'm not a fan of flax or chia in my smoothie. Obviously, you can leave these out, and some of Becky's recipes do, but the bulk of the smoothies contain one or the other. Tricky slimy omegas, please do not fluff up my smoothie like that!

Photos: A few color shots, but c'mon! How many smoothie pictures do you need?

Focus: Low-sugar, nutrient dense green smoothies.

XGFXness: 100% XGFX

Onto the FREE STUFF! This
giveaway is open worldwide. To win your own free digital copy of this book,
simply leave a comment on this post by midnight Pacific time on
Wednesday, January 23rd 2013 (please make sure to leave contact
information), and I'll draw a random winner.

Disclaimer: I received a free review copy of 40 Days of Green Smoothies from Becky Striepe. No
compensation or gift was exchanged for this review, and the opinion posted here is my own.

Hmm, I eat a smoothie everyday for breakfast, but I've never been brave enough to put anything green in it. So far, I'm doing strictly banana and berries with chocolate Silk and chocolate Vega powder. I wonder if this book would help me get more nutrients without sacrificing taste?

Beckie told me I can share a recipe, so here's one. Give it a try and see how it goes!

"When you’re making your smoothies, you might have trouble getting that last piece of fruit or ice to blend down. Most blenders have a pulse or ice crush option that’s perfect for solving this problem. Just do a few pulses, pausing for a few seconds in between each one to let that stubborn chunk of fruit or ice settle near the blade again. You can also add an extra splash of liquid, if things seem like they’re not moving in the blender."

This sounds great! I love Becky's blog, and her smoothie book sounds right up my alley. Like you, I often have a problem making too much. A little bit of this and a little bit of that, and suddenly I have a gargantuan smoothie.

This sounds like such an awesome e-book! I enjoy at least one green smoothie/week but would work with the structure of a program, especially a shopping/budget friendly plan that included new variety. Solid review!

Well poo - I left a thoughtful comment the other day, and my phone ate it.So - in short, I had a few weeks of green monsters last year, but I really started getting sick of the same recipe I was using over and over. This recipe book would help in that!Also - I wonder about using other greens like collards and not tons of frozen fruit - does it *taste* like a collard smoothie? Cause ... well ... that doesn't sound appetizing. I hope they are well disguised tasty smoothies full of health goo that you can't necessarily taste =D

I'm with you, I like fruit in my smoothies, so this book isn't for me, which is probably good since I see this giveaway has all ready ended. I put chia seeds in most of my smoothies AFTER blending, then it's like frog eye smoothie (still slimy) rather than swamp pond scum smoothie (slimier). xx

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